Hello, I've been playing Heroes of the Storm since the closed Beta, E.T.C. was my very first Warrior, and is one of my most played Heroes.
I don't claim to be an E.T.C. expert, but I have some good advice to give new player, or to those who don't know how to properly play the character.

E.T.C. is short for Elite Tauren Chieftain, which is the name of a band comprised of blizzard employees, they preform at Blizzcon and have songs based off of the Warcraft universe.
E.T.C. is not a character from any Blizzard game, but rather the mascot for Blizzards badass band.


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E.T.C. is a warrior hero, and meant to played in a utility heavy role, you'll be zoning, peeling, and securing kills for your team, rather than straight up tanking like Johanna or Muradin.
His viability is questionable by most players, but I still believe you can make a meaningful impact on any game, and I certainly don't believe him to be "unplayable", you just have to know how to properly play the character.

Let's review his strengths and weaknesses, with a simple pros and cons list.

PROS

• High mobility.
• Great disruption.
• Good sustain.
• Great at protecting his allies.
• Amazing at setting up kills.
• A body blocking master.
• Mosh Pit, nuff said.

CONS

• Low damage output.
• Quite mana hungry.
• Fairly team dependent.
• Terrible at clearing minion waves.

Zoning.

This is fairly simple, zoning is about engaging the enemy to keep them away from key points, or fleeing allies. It's not about securing kills, but to harass enough to scare them off, or to keep them at bay a little longer while your team secures objectives.

A good example of this, on Blackheart's Bay at the coin turn in, instead of you standing next to your teammates, you'd run a little further ahead towards the enemy's base, that way you'll see enemies coming long before they get to the chest.
You just have to CC, and harass them to make sure they don't go where they want to go.
Just don't feed, disengage when you're in any real danger.

Peeling.

Peeling is creating space between allies, and the enemy, you are "peeling" the enemy away from your team.
This is done with Crowd Control, displacement, and even body blocking.

A good example of this, The Butcher just charged a friendly Kael'thas, you'd use Powerslide to position yourself in between The Butcher and Kael'thas, and then Face Melt The Butcher away, making sure you're in between him and Kael'thas, until your ally gets to safety.

Body Blocking

The most self-explanatory, and easiest to execute.
All you have to do is position yourself in between who you want to block, and where they want to go.
You usually move, attack, move, attack, repeat, that way you're getting off damage, without lagging behind your target.

(Q) Powerslide

This is your bread and butter as E.T.C., it's a skill shot ability that charges you to the target location, stunning any enemy caught in it's path, and doing some decent damage.
This is your main source of mobility, and Crowd Control.
You will be using Powerslide to engage, disengage, pursue, set up kills, disrupt channels, and much more.
However, it's very easy to get carried away using this ability, since you get launched so far forward you could potentially split too far away from your team, and just end up getting yourself killed.
Use this ability wisely, don't go spamming it any chance you get, it's on a fairly long CD, and it can eat away at your mana quickly.

(W) Face Melt

The second tool in E.T.C.'s kit, It's an AOE knock back that also deals some minor damage.
This can be a bit of a double-edged sword if not used correctly.
You will want to be using this primarily for zone control, knocking targets away from a location, or away from an ally in danger, it can also be used to clump targets close together(if positioned correctly), so if you have a Jaina or Kael'thas you can assist them in getting tons of AOE damage off, and potentially wiping the enemy team.
You also will be using Face Melt in combination with Powerslide to slingshot targets towards your team, and help secure kills, use this combo sparingly though, it will cost you quite a hefty amount of mana, and its completely useless if you don't have a good damage dealer to help secure the kill, not to mention it can put you in some serious danger.
Now what you DON'T want to be doing with Face Melt is pushing fleeing targets AWAY from your team, as much as you want that last hit, it's not worth risking your target getting away, more than likely you'd help the enemy escape, seeing as Face Melt does so little damage.
You DON'T want to be using it to knock targets out of your teams abilities, such as Nazeebo's Zombie Wall, Jaina's Ring of Frost, Nova's Precision Strike, and many many more, be very aware of what your team is doing before mashing that W key.
And last but not least, you DO NOT want to use this for damage, I see too many first time E.T.C.'s try and use Face Melt for damage, and let me tell you, this ability doesn't deal hardly any damage.
Instead of wasting mana on minion waves, and pointless harass, you should focus on using it for zone control, as it's meant to be used. Positioning, and timing are key with this ability, it's not very difficult to use, but it's very easy to use poorly.

(E) Guitar Solo

This is the core of E.T.C.'s sustain, it's not much healing, but it's still healing.
It has a moderate CD, and a low mana cost, don't spam it, but use it fairly often.
This is also the best way to activate your trait, without having to use up too much mana.
Not much else to say, it's a good self heal.

(Trait) Rockstar

Probably one of my favorite traits in the game.
After using an ability, you, and all allies around you gain 20% increased attack speed for 4 seconds.
This is primarily a buff for you, but it also really benefits auto attacking heroes such as Valla, The Butcher, and Sgt. Hammer, and helps deal extra damage during team fights, or when sieging down a fort.
You'll want to be standing close to your auto attackers, use Guitar Solo to boost them up, get off some attacks yourself, Powerslide potential kill targets, Face Melt threats away from your squishies, maybe a Mosh Pit if the need arises, and if all goes well, you'll dominate the team fight.

(R) Mosh Pit

FEEL THE GLORY OF METAL!
This is E.T.C.'s most devastating tool in his entire kit.
After short delay, you become immobile and channel an AOE stun, that disables any hero caught in it's radius for 4 seconds. This wipes more teams than almost any other heroic ability in the entirety of the nexus.
You'll want to combo it with Powerslide, that way you're right in the middle of the enemy team, and the stun should give you enough time to cast without them escaping, or interrupting.
Don't waste it on just one target, try to land Mosh Pit on at least 3 targets, the more you stun, the more you'll kill. Although you have some priority targets(check the threat list on the first build.), it's very easy to get knocked out of your Heroic, so make sure you hit the heroes that can disrupt your Mosh Pit.
Most importantly however, if you land a Mosh Pit without your team, or any of your damage dealers, it's completely wasted, make sure your team can take advantage of it, or you'll have to wait 2 minutes before you can Mosh again.
A good thing to do, is to tell your teammates at the beginning of a match, whenever you assist ping, you're about to mosh, so that can give them more time to prepare, and position. Be sure not to use Mosh Pit immediately after pinging, as that gives your team no prep time.
It also helps to call out whenever Mosh Pit is almost off CD, so your team knows to hold off on some hard to hit heroics like Ring of Frost, Precision Strike, and Ravenous Spirit, or some Mosh Pit ruining heroics like Wandering Keg, Sundering, and Devouring Maw.

(R) Stage Dive

Unfortunately, this Heroic falls flat compared to the team fighting potential of Mosh Pit.
This Heroic has a global range, so you can essentially be everywhere at once.
This can be useful on maps like Dragon Shire or Sky Temple, since teams aren't grouped as often, but it's so hard to sacrifice Mosh Pit.
However if the enemy team just has wayyy too much CC to cancel your Mosh Pit, you can consider taking Stage Dive, it isn't completely useless...
However, never take Stage Dive on smaller maps like Haunted Mines or Tomb of the Spider Queen, the small choke points in those maps are perfect for landing Mosh Pit, and you wouldn't want to waste team wiping potential like that now would you?

Talents are one of the best things about Heroes of the Storm, and one of the key features that set it apart from other MOBA style games.
While there are builds, and other such sets to follow(much like the ones on this guide), you want to be picking your talents based on your team, and the opposition, you want to be able to adapt to whatever best suits your situation.
I will be looking through all of E.T.C.'s talents, and informing you which talents are worth picking, and why.

LEVEL 1

Good. Longer range on Powerslide means you can initiate from safer distances, stun more targets, and keep up with fleeing enemies better. All in all, a great pick no matter what you decide to build for.

Situational This adds a little extra bulk to E.T.C., and helps mitigate a lot of damage from auto attacking heroes like The Butcher, Sgt. Hammer, and Raynor, but falls a little flat when going against fast auto attacking heroes like Illidan, and Tychus.

Good. It was a good pick before, but now with the recent buffs, increasing the mana cost reduction from 40% to 60%, its a must have! E.T.C. is a fairly mana hungry hero, and this basically makes your most spammed ability, free to cast, which keeps your mana bar nice and high.

Situational. With the recent changes to this talent, increasing the amount of extra healing from regen globes makes it finally worth picking. I've done extensive testing on the PTR, while I still don't think it's a "must have" talent, it's great if you want extra sustain, and aren't planning on taking Guitar Hero at level 7. It also does synergies well with Groupies, since the increased healing applies to allies. If you aren't good at collecting regen globes with other heroes, you might want to steer clear of this talent, E.T.C. is one of the worst wave clearing heroes in the game, so it's very difficult to consistently collect globes on your own.

LEVEL 4

Good. Increase the width and speed of Powerslide? Yes please. Even if you don't pick Rolling Like a Stone at level 1, this is still an amazing pick. The increased width means targets don't have to be AS close together to get stunned, and the increased speed means it's pretty much impossible to avoid. This almost makes Mosh Pit too easy to land.

Situational. Now with Pwn Shop Guitar's recent buff, getting this ability for mana management isn't as useful, while it's still easy on your mana bar, there are other talent picks to look out for. That doesn't mean this talent is bad, now you just get it for the increased duration, or if you didn't pick up Pwn Shop Guitar. This does work very well with Sgt. Hammer giving her much longer increased attack speed. Hehe HAMMER-on, coincidence? I think not.

Good. With the recent buff to both Face Melt and this talent, you gain a significant amount more control on E.T.C.. If you're able to hit 3 targets, you can reduce your Face Melt cooldown to 5 seconds! After using Powerslide you can Face Melt up to 3 times before it's off cooldown, whereas before you could only use it once. It's almost require to get Loud Speakers at level 7, since it will make hitting 3 targets, much more consistent.

Bad. Nope, this talent literally does nothing for you, I feel ashamed I've actually picked Pinball Wizard before. "But we use Powerslide + Face Melt on E.T.C. all the time, how can extra damage be bad?" I'll show you, with the power of math! So at level 4, when you pick Pinball Wizard, your Face Melt does 75 damage. We increase the damage by 50%, and we get 112, thats 37 extra damage, which is actually pretty decent early on. But wait, we're not done here. At level 10, Face Melt deals 105 base damage, 157 with the bonus, so you only get 52 extra damage. Our damage has only increased by 15 since level 4. And by level 20 Face Melt is doing 155 damage, and 232 with the increase, that means our extra damage is 77. We've only increased our damage by 40 since first getting Pinball Wizard, it may be "okay" in the early game, but it scales so poorly, it's just a wasted talent mid - late game. If it was 200% increased damage, it might worth it, but a 50% increase is too insignificant

LEVEL 7

Good. pairing this ability with Mic Check is glorious, and even better when paired with Face Smelt, this gives E.T.C. so much more control, on top of his already amazing control heavy kit. Be cautious though, misplaced Face Melt's are much more punishing because of the increased knockback, so make sure you land them correctly.

Good. This is an amazing talent for sustain, even if you have a Support on your team. 50% of the damage you deal with auto attacks returns as health, this is actually quite a lot of healing. If you want some extra bulk, or want to be able to hold down points longer(like on Dragon Shire or Sky Temple), seriously consider Guitar Hero.

Situational. If the enemy team has a lot of soft CC(roots, and slows), this talent is quite amazing. However if the enemy has a lot of hard CC(stuns, polymorphs, and silences), it can be a bit tricky to get the most use out of. So if the enemy has soft CC, you use it reactively. If the enemy has hard CC, you use it preemptively. It's very useful in both cases, you just have to know when to use it.

Bad. You sacrifice too much to take this talent, and the payoff is very insignificant. The only time you'll notice the extra damage is when taking merc camps, but Guitar Hero is better for solo camping anyway. If you need extra damage, get Echo Pedal at level 16, get something better this talent tier.

LEVEL 10

HELL YEAH! ALWAYS A CROWD PLEASER!

Yeeaahh... I guess it's okay...

LEVEL 13

Situational. "Wait, E.T.C. is a Warrior, not a Support, why would I pick this talent?" Well, E.T.C. actually has some decent Support potential, you're already zoning and peeling to protect your allies, and also increasing their attack speed, now you can also heal them to keep them in fights longer! This is very useful in cases where you don't have a Support, or have a side-support like Tyrande, or Tassadar, or a Support with weak AOE healing like Uther, or Rehgar. As I mentioned before, you can increase the healing done with Prog Rock at level 1.

Good. Basically turns your Face Melt into Rehgar's Earthgrasp Totem. It's just more CC on top of an already amazing kit, how can that possibly be bad?

Good. Definitely the most versatile pick this talent bracket. It gives you extra bulk when initiating, and when disengaging. I mean, you want more damage mitigation on a Warrior don't you?

Situational. The strongest, but most situational pick here. If the enemy team has big ability damage like Jaina, Kael'thas, or Zeratul, this will help mitigate a ton of damage, and it will help you keep putting on pressure to the enemy team, and help keep you in team fights longer.

LEVEL 16

Good. Fantastic ability for both you, and your teammates. Any time you use an ability, you, and teammates around you, get a 20% speed boost for 2 seconds. This is great for chasing, and disengaging. Speed Metal ensures you will be able to get off that much needed Powerslide on a fleeing target, or even that last minute escape to keep allies alive. This ability works well no matter what you're building for. Keep in mind Rockstar does have a fairly short range, so make sure you're close to allies if they need the speed boost.

Good. E.T.C. is very weak when it comes to clearing out minion waves, so this talent helps a great deal. I know what you might be thinking, why get something to push out lanes so late into the game? Well, while this talent would be better earlier in the talent tier(like the good old days...), that doesn't make it any less useful, being able to effectively clear lanes is still important in the late game, regardless of how many objectives, or merc camps you have pushing. It doesn't just increase E.T.C.'s wave clear however, it also gives him a fairly decent power spike against heroes. Echo Pedal is kind of like a bursty version of Burning Rage, now it's not a world ending amount of damage, but if you're able to time your abilities correctly, and make sure each pulse hits the hero(s), it can really add up.

Situational. Only get this talent if you have Face Smelt, otherwise, more often than not, they'll just walk right past your second Face Melt, going in the opposite direction you originally wanted them in. The slow you get from Face Smelt, plus the extra knock back from Encore essentially roots targets in place, keeping them from going where they want to, wether it's securing points, or securing kills, this is a fantastic CC talent when paired with Face Smelt.

Situational. Get this against very threatening auto attacking heroes like Sgt. Hammer, Valla, and The Butcher, you will effectively halve their DPS against you, and if you have Block, you'll take significantly less damage, making those heroes immediately regret attacking you. A very strong pick to help with survivability.

LEVEL 20

Very Good. Did you miss Mosh Pit? Is the duration just not long enough? No big deal, just Powerslide towards the enemy team and keep the party alive! Seriously, it's one of the best level 20 Heroic upgrades in the game, you better have a good reason for not picking it. Maybe you're just a prodigy at landing the perfect Mosh Pit, then I guess you don't need to take it... I guess...

Good... Y'know, IF you picked Stage Dive. Hitting every member of the enemy team completely resets Stage Dive's cooldown, so thats cool, but It's very unlikely. The increased radius makes things like that easier, and just hitting one enemy reduces it's cooldown by 15 seconds, so it encourages more offensive usage of Stage Dive, which is alright. But on a serious note... Why didn't you pick Mosh Pit?

Situational. If you picked Stage Dive you can still get the Godlike Heroic that is Mosh Pit... but for a price... Even if you did pick Mosh Pit you can still get some use out of this Heroic. While I really don't encourage you to go kamikaze, if you find yourself dying mid Mosh Pit, this will help you keep up your team wiping Heroic even after death.

Situational. If you and your team need some extra bulk, and you don't have a Support that took this talent, you can really catch the enemy off guard when their Jaina's Blizzard did almost no damage to your entire team. If you've played Support heroes before you should be very familiar with how this talent works, if you aren't, well then, maybe play more Supports before taking this talent.

Undecided With as much as I've played E.T.C., I haven't tried using this talent on him very often. I can see it's applications being very useful, catching people off guard when suddenly E.T.C. appears! But again, I haven't spent much time experimenting with it, there are just much better picks this level Bolt of the Storm always end up being forgotten.

As I said before, you want to pick your talents based on your team, and the opposition, but picking a good build doesn't hurt your chances in winning games. Use these as templates, and tweak around with some of the talent picks to help better suit your play style, or situation.

The Melter of Faces!:

With the recent changes to Face Melt this build is the new standard, you're only going to have a 5 second cooldown on Face Melt (if used correctly), so you will be able to control crowds significantly better than most Warrior's in the game, you can push crowds around to wherever you want them to be with ease.
With the increased number of Face Melt's being thrown out, you will be increasing the amount of mana you consume, so Pwn Shop Guitar is highly recommended to help keep your mana bar nice and high.
Be careful though, this build can be quite the double-edged sword, you can potentially spread enemies away from AOE spells like Blizzard, or knock them closer to low health teammates.
But you can also knock an entire team away from allies, and spread them away from capture points, I've stolen many bosses with a numbers disadvantage using this build, without even using Mosh Pit, it is very strong.


Powerslide Baby!:

With this build you are able to land Mosh Pit much much easier, and just overall makes engages/disengages go much more smoothly.
The only key talents with this build are Rolling Like a Stone, Double-Necked Guitar, and Mosh Pit, everything else can be changed to whatever suits your fancy.


You Can't Kill the Metal!:

A heavy sustain build, and a hybrid Support build.
The main focus here is Guitar Solo and Rockstar, you will be buffing and healing allies much like a Support would, but have plenty of sustain for yourself to still be a frontline Warrior.
I'd recommend this build for newer players, since you can keep yourself healthy, and its easy on your mana bar.

"If your team is crazy, you get crazy too." -FourCourtJester, Heroesfire Admin/Developer

Some of the best advice you can give to any player, it's always best to go with your team, regardless of what it is they decide to do, even if it's the wrong thing.

Early Game, Level 1:

This is the laning phase, don't use Powerslide or Face Melt on minions, it's just a waste of mana, instead, save those abilities for disengaging, or securing early game kills.
Don't get too greedy, if you chase too deep you're just going to get yourself killed.

You are terrible at clearing waves, and do fairly low damage, so try to get in lane with an Assassin or Specialist, as you're not going to get anything done on your own.
Supports are not recommended to lane with, unless they are good at clearing minions waves like Rehgar, or can dish out some decent damage and/or CC like Tyrande.

When objectives spawn, you need to be there, you're not good at split pushing anyway.
Make sure you zone the enemy away from where they want to be, and keep your team safe while they contest.

Mid Game, Level 10:

This is where the game will start to swing in your favor, I've had so many games start off terribly, just to suddenly swing at level 10 and secure my team the win.

This is simply because Mosh Pit is such a game changing Heroic, as long as you're patient, and wait for juust the right time, you can secure so many kills, and sky rocket your team ahead of the enemy.

Make sure to grab the objectives, keep your team safe, and maybe after that MLG 360 Quick-Cast Mosh Pit you just landed, grab a boss and some mercs, because you can.

Late Game, Level 20:

This is when s**t gets real, if you can land a team wiping Mosh Pit this late in the game, you'll easily be able to secure your team the win, just don't get cocky, and make sure to play it safe.

Sgt. Hammer and E.T.C. is an incredibly powerful combo. One of the most powerful in my humble opinion. Your job is to keep the siege tank alive, you will do everything in your power to make sure Sgt. Hammer can freely fire upon who ever she pleases. You will be buffing her attack speed, and slingshotting enemies in her firing range, helping to secure kills. Sgt. Hammer also loves it when enemies stand still, so getting off a good Mosh Pit allows her to melt the enemy team.

Grav-O-Bomb 3000 need I say more? You Mosh Pit into Grav-O-Bomb 3000, or Gazlowe Grav-O-Bomb 3000 into your Mosh Pit, either way, the entire enemy team is stunned with minimal effort... If you're coordinated enough, you can even chain stun the entire enemy team, by staggering both abilities. I've used this, and have been on the receiving of the duo, it's incredibly devastating if done correctly.

E.T.C. and Johanna are a terrifying frontline to go up against. One thing E.T.C. struggles with, is being a full time Warrior, it's possible, but very difficult, and can sometimes put you into positions where you can't Mosh Pit, or dive to save team members. Johanna can full time tank for days, so she allows you to pick less tanky talents, and build for more utility where you otherwise couldn't. Johanna is also amazing at clumping enemies close together, making it far easier for you to land that team wiping Mosh Pit

You know the Heroic Jaina never uses? What was it... Ring of Frost? Yeah, you're going to want to use it after trying out this combo. When E.T.C. uses Mosh Pit, Jaina launches down Blizzard, and Cone of Cold for massive burst damage, and if any survived, Jaina can set up a Ring of Frost just before Mosh Pit ends, to finish off any who might have escaped, this duo can 2v5 team wipe if both Heroics are placed perfectly, very devastating, and very fun to use.

Medivac Dropship nuff said. You become a global team wiping killing machine with Lt. Morales, driving around the tour bus of death, to greet all of it's loyal groupies with the most head banging Mosh Pit in the entirety of the nexus. Make sure the whole band is together, you can't put on a show with just a solo guitarist. It is recommended to also queue with an AOE damage dealer, like Jaina, Kael'thas, or Azmodan, since E.T.C. + Lt. Morales have very small damage output.

I hope this guide helps, please be sure to leave some feedback, and let me know if there's anything you think I could to do to improve this guide. :)

And be sure to check out my Uther guide here